Juma Mosque and Madrasa

Friday mosque with attached Islamic school, housing the town's history museum

The Juma Mosque — the Friday Mosque — is the largest and most important of Ordubad's three historic mosques. Built in the eighteenth century, it incorporates an attached madrasa, the Islamic school that was part of the town's scholarly tradition. The history museum established here in 1981 occupies the madrasa building and can be visited as part of a stop at the mosque complex.

The courtyard of the Juma Mosque is shaded by mature trees that give it an almost park-like atmosphere in summer. The stonework of the entrance portal is particularly fine — carved decorative panels frame the doorway in the style of Azerbaijani medieval architecture. The mosque is still active; the museum can usually be accessed separately through a side entrance.

things to do sight
A story
Ordubad was one of the earliest printing centres in the Caucasus region — the first Azerbaijani-language books were printed here in the eighteenth century, at a time when the town was a significant centre of scholarship and Islamic learning.